A History of Greek Economic Thought

by Albert Augustus Trever

[105]. Bonar (Philosophy and Political Economy, pp. 13 f.) criticizes Rep. 400-402 for not seeing that unlimited wealth is necessary for the realization of the highest art and beauty.

[106]. Plato also emphasizes this, Laws 743E, 870B: οὐ χρὴ πλουτεῖν ζητεῖν τὸν εὐδαίμονα ἐσόμενον, ἀλλὰ δικαίως πλουτεῖν καὶ σωφρόνως; 660E; though he implies that unlimited wealth is necessarily evil.

[107]. Rep. 552B-D; cf. Robin, op. cit., p. 243, n. 1, on κηφήν.

[108]. In Mun. Pul., III, 91 (Vol. XVII, 213), he makes Circe’s swine a type of false consumption; cf. Fors Clav., Letter 38 (Vol. XXVIII, 30 ff.); Mun. Pul., Pref., 16 (Vol. XVII, 139 f.); Queen of the Air, III, 124 ff. (Vol. XIX, 404 ff.); Pol. Econ. of Art, I, 48 ff. (Vol. XVI, 47 ff.); Unto This Last, IV, 76 (Vol. XVII, 102); Mill also attacked this idea.

[109]. Unto This Last, II, 40 (Vol. XVII, 56); cf. also Mun. Pul., II, 54 (Vol. XVII, 178 f.).

[110]. Discussed above.

[111]. Cf. Pol. 281D-283A, for an excellent description of the weaving industry; also Crat. 388C ff.; Phileb. 56B, on carpentry.

[112]. Pol. 287D-289B; cf. Espinas, op. cit., pp. 35 f.; “L’Art économie dans Platon,” Revue des Etudes Grecques, XXVII (1914), 106 ff.

[113]. Pol. 281D-E; cf. also Phaedo 99A-B; Phileb. 27A; Timaeus 46C-D.

[114]. Sophist. 219A-D. Bonar’s (op. cit., p. 20) criticism of this on the ground that learning may produce something new, while the arts may merely change the shape of things, takes Plato too seriously. We have here only a characteristic Platonic generalization. Cf. Shorey, Unity of Plato’s Thought (1903), p. 64, n. 500, on the foregoing passages from Sophist. and Pol.; cf. Robin, op. cit., pp. 231 f.